Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, Western Europe and Canada, Volume VI, Part 1

Conference files, lot 59 D 95, CF 131

No. 142
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Secretary of State¹

top secret

[Paris,] December 14, 1952.

Participants:

• Secretary Acheson
• M. Jean Monnet, President of the High Authority of the Coal and Steel Community

Mr. Monnet called at his request, having come to Paris from Luxembourg.² He wished to talk with me about the present status of developments looking toward European union, with particular reference to the current crisis over the European Army.³

Mr. Monnet asked me first to tell him what the impression was in the United States, including my own impression, of the present situation of the Schuman Plan and of the discussions looking toward a political union. I said that, speaking of usually informed American opinion, I thought that there was absolutely no current knowledge of any activity. So far as I personally was concerned, I was in the same situation. I had known about the inconclusive and somewhat discouraging meetings of the Ministers, which had ended in the organization of the High Authority at Luxembourg. I had heard nothing whatever it had done since its organization. So far as the ad hoc committee on European political union was concerned, I was under the impression, and I thought most other Americans were, that it was practically in “cold storage”. Mr. Monnetseemed to attach great significance to this reply and said that it was most important that something be done to inform people of the current situation, which he believed to be very hopeful. He then discussed it as follows:

The High Authority was formed and operating successfully. It was already having an impact upon business and economic affairs. The broad market comprising the six countries would be inaugurated in February. Already manufacturers were adapting their business to it. French manufacturers were making contracts to sell in South Germany. Ruhr manufacturers were making contracts for delivery in North Africa. At the same time, the ore committee was in operation. It was preparing to sell French ore in quantities to Belgium for the first time and arrangements were being made for a considerable increase in French ore production for this purpose, as well as for the purpose of the broader market.

The High Authority, which had the power to impose a tax up to 1% on the annual production of all manufactures, would announce in December the imposition of a tax to take effect in February. This would produce in the neighborhood of $50,000,000 a year, which would go into a revolving fund for loan purposes to increase facilities. He thought the operations of the plan had already completely changed the method of thinking of both the producers and consumers of coal and steel and of parliamentarians in the six countries. Regarding the unionization of this industry, he thought it would very shortly have even more far-reaching effects which would condition thinking both in regard to the European Army and in regard to the political unification proposals.

He then turned to the question of the EDC. He thought that this situation should be divided into two parts. One was the court crisis in Germany, which he regarded as very serious and as to the solution of which he had no specific suggestion. The other part related to the longer term view, assuming that this German crisis could be overcome.

As to the first of these matters, he said that the great danger was that in getting through the constitutional law question Adenauer had to resolve the problem without creating the impression in Germany and elsewhere that the Government was setting aside the constitution since otherwise he would greatly disturb all democratic opinion in Germany and would also create the impression in France and the other countries that Germany was again moving in a totalitarian direction. He said that he had talked to Hallstein yesterday, telling Hallstein that he was going to see me. He asked Hallstein whether the present crisis reflected any change in policy or uncertainty about policy on the Chancellor’s part. Hallstein had assured him that this was not the case, and that the Chancellor was resolved to press forward with the matter of ratification, but that he had to be careful to solve it without incurring the dangers mentioned above. Monnet said that he believed that this did represent the Chancellor’s view and that the Chancellor was sincere.

Turning to the broader question, he said that he believed that both the Coalition and the Socialists were strongly in favor of European unification. Among the Socialists, he thought that this feeling was deepest in the trade unions. His talks with Germans, both in connection with the Schuman Plan and with trade unionists and Socialists, led him to believe that the foundation of this attitude was that these Germans felt that the greatest danger to liberty in Germany was being left alone. They needed and wanted the support of unification with the other free peoples of Western Europe. They had all in various ways said to him that the emergence of a totalitarian party and movement in Germany, if Germany were alone, would result in his phrase, which he quoted from German, of the great mass of Germans “taking the color of the wall”. He meant by this, he said, that in view of past experience Germans would not take the risk of opposing the totalitarian movement in an isolated Germany because that had been a fatalistic belief that it would succeed even though it started as a minority, and that those who opposed would be marked for destruction. He said that in private Adenauer had assured him that he was in favor of unification with Western Europe even before unification of Germany, but that it would take him a little while to be able to work around to this view publicly.

Coming more specifically to the EDC issue, he believed that the labor unions were in favor of EDC. The Socialists as a political party were against all rearmament whether in the form of EDC or a national army, but more especially against the latter. They believed that they could not control their generals and they felt that the EDC, as modified in its later stages as the result of Van Zeeland’s intransigeance, had not produced a European army under civilian control but had in Monnet’s phrase created a “cartel of generals”. He thought, therefore, that it was of the greatest importance to get quick action along the lines of political unification at the same time that the ratification of the EDC was going forward. He thought that in both cases action must be taken quickly but that great care should be taken not to press the EDC purely as a military expedient or too much in advance of progress in the political field.

Turning then to political unification, he said that the primary problems came from the British and the Belgians. The secondary problem came from the French Socialists. American political help was very important in helping to resolve these two since if they were not resolved, progress could be made neither with the EDC nor with political union. He explained this situation by describing what he thought was necessary and what he thought could be done very quickly if the obstacles mentioned above could be withdrawn. What was essential was that there should be a real yielding of sovereignty in specific fields. It was not enough to have machinery, even complicated machinery behind a considerable facade, to reconcile and bring together national policies. He gave illustrations to show that it was impossible to break through traditional moulds of thought, if one maintained the complete idea of national sovereignty in the fields concerned. The moment a new promise, that is, a merging of sovereignty, was made, then thinking proceeded upon a new basis. It was also necessary to create a new institution, which sprang directly from the people themselves; otherwise they had no participation and the institution had no reality or life. Therefore, his view of the new political institutions was that they should be based upon a European parliament elected by all people of the six countries and exercising legislative power in a prescribed field. This parliament would create the executive in accordance with the parlimentary system. This parliament and executive should exercise sovereign power in what would be at first a limited field. He would not extend the field at the outset beyond that covered by the Schuman Plan and by EDC. Other things would develop later on but very soon it would not be necessary to cede to the new parliament greater substantive powers than had been ceded under the Schuman Plan and the EDC. The parliament’s function and legislative authority, as well as that of the executive, would be in creating new, more workable and merged administrative and executive arrangements for carrying out the substance of the Schuman Plan and the EDC. This would very soon disclose the necessities for furthering grants of sovereign power in fields ancillary to the two primary ones and which he thought would not be very difficult. Among them would be limited powers of taxation.

One of the first and greatest benefits and reassurances of this development would be to put the European Army under political and civilian control. The present arrangements in EDC were wholly illusory, the Council of Ministers, etc. These present arrangements would either result in inefficiency or in their being swept aside and the control taken by the military themselves. He thought it was a mistake to attempt to amend or patch up the EDC. He was in favor of accepting it as it was and improving it through the new political authority.

He believed that the ad hoc group would come up with proposals along these lines unless it was altogether frustrated by Van Zeeland. The hope was that Van Zeeland would be eliminated in the next elections. He thought that Spaak was in agreement with what Monnet described above.

This being the necessary line of development, in his opinion, the British and the Belgians, the latter for the reasons stated above, presented a great obstacle, and he thought no real progress could be made unless and until the British were straightened out. He was not sure whether the British attitude sprang from a real opposition to European unity or from muddle-headedness, or from both. But the ideas which they were putting forward, whether at Strasbourg or elsewhere, always ended up in a loose association, in which all national sovereignties were preserved intact, and in which the alleged representatives who met really represented nobody. The idea to which the British must come, if there was to be progress, was that they should support and not impede true unity on the continent and then associate themselves, without giving up their ultimate sovereignty, with the new united Europe. As an illustration of what might be done, he referred to his talks with the British about possible developments in relation to the Schuman Plan. He believed that the British in that case should work toward an arrangement, by which the British, through voluntarily accepting the same standards and rules which the Schuman Plan put into effect, would be admitted to the benefits of the larger market to the extent that their adoption of these rules and standards permitted. They would always remain free to change their own action, but at the cost of losing benefits. The same general development could take place in regard to the political union of Western Europe in association with the British. He thought that one of the greatest contributions we could make would be in inducing the British to adopt this attitude.

He then turned to the French Socialists. Their difficulty, he said, was not inherent in the French Socialist Party, which would like to go along with the idea of European unity but sprang from the attitude of the German Socialists and of the British. The French Socialists, he said, felt lonely and outnumbered in what they regarded as a predominantly conservative and catholic association. They would feel wholly differently if the German Socialists came along and if Britain took the attitude mentioned above.

He concluded by saying that while there were many dark clouds in the European sky, he did not think that the situation was basically depressing. In fact, he believed that it was basically encouraging, with three provisos: (1) that the crisis in Germany could be surmounted; (2) that the British would be cooperative and (3) that the new administration in the United States would continue the policy of unification of Europe, in regard to which he believed from his talks with General Eisenhower that the General believed in it very deeply indeed. He reiteriated that current developments in the Schuman Plan were, in his opinion, having an effect of the most profound importance and would continue to have this effect to such an extent that, if given a chance, they could profoundly alter the whole attitude toward and speed of movement toward European unity.

He then asked me how I viewed the situation. I said that what he had told me in regard to these Schuman Plan developments was new to me, but unquestionably important and encouraging. I was glad to be encouraged because the situation had seemed to me most depressing indeed. Last June, I had hoped and believed that there was a spirit and momentum toward European unity, including ratification of the EDC, which would in the year 1952 carry all of these matters so far along the road that neither Soviet obstruction nor the natural hesitancy of nations to take such far-reaching steps could prevent the accomplishment of something almost unparalled in history. However, it had seemed to me that the momentum had been lost, retrogression had set in, and that we might now be on the very verge of complete disaster. I pointed out the amazing distance which the United States had gone in responding to European initiatives, which were as brilliant as they were novel—the OEEC, the Marshall Plan, the North Atlantic Treaty, the development of the unified command with its concomitant of the restoration of German sovereignty and German participation and the stationing of American troops in Europe. All of this I said, in my jugment, depended for its continuance upon Europe going through with the plans and ideas which it had originated, and developing here a community politically united, strong economically and militarily, which we could and would continue to support as the central point of our foreign policy. However, if the European effort fell apart, all basis of American policy would begin to disintegrate. It was not an easy thing to maintain the American ground, air and naval forces in Europe which we will maintain in view of the great need for those forces in other parts of the world, particularly in Korea, where, for instance, we have no army reserve of any sort whatever. It was worthwhile and necessary to do what we are doing, if by so doing we were helping the Europeans themselves to build a new and strong Europe. It was quite quixotic to do this if the Europeans themselves gave up the struggle. If the EDC went to pieces, I saw the gravest difficulties opening up for the new Administration. It is hard for me to see how Germans and Frenchmen, who had seen us go so far to meet real statesman-like efforts on their part, could risk their own defense and future in the way which was now going on. I did not see that there was very much, if anything, that I could do now, representing an administration which had only a few weeks of responsibility left. I could not say that we had overlooked or neglected anything which we could have done in the past.

Monnet thought that it would be helpful if Schuman, Eden and I could make another declaration strongly supporting the unification of Europe, including the EDC, and he referred to the importance of the statement which had been made by Morrison, Schuman and myself in September 1951,⁴ and by Schuman, Eden, Adenauer and me after our Paris meeting in May 1952.⁵ I said that I could not propose such a declaration at this late date and doubted whether Mr. Eden and Mr. Schuman would think it appropriate since they would probably believe that it was more important what the new Administration thought than what the old one thought. Monnet agreed with this. He said that it would be most helpful if NATO could make some declaration but wondered whether we could get anything past Van Zeeland which would be strong enough on the general theory of unification. He thought it a mistake to single out the EDC and treat this by itself solely as a military problem. He thought that this would not be the way to get support in Germany and France. However, if it could be put in its proper setting, it would be helpful. He thought that it would be most helpful if Mr. Dulles and General Eisenhower find some appropriate opportunity to express their support for the European movement, including the EDC. He expressed the view that from his knowledge and conversations with both of these gentlemen, he believed that they felt strongly that it should be supported. I said that I could not tell whether they would regard such a statement as appropriate.

Mr. Monnetsaid that he was going to see Mr. Harriman today and would have talks with various French leaders. He might wish to get in touch with me again today or tomorrow.⁶

1. This conversation was summarized in telegram 3507 from Paris, Dec. 16. (740.5/12–1652)
2. Secretary Acheson was in Paris to attend the meetings of the North Atlantic Council held Dec. 15–18.
3. For documentation concerning the attitude of the United States toward the establishment of a European Defense Community, see vol. v, Part 1, pp. 571 ff.
4. For the text of the Tripartite Declaration of Sept. 14, see Department of State Bulletin, Sept. 24, 1951, p. 485. For documentation concerning the Washington Foreign Ministers meeting Sept. 10–14, 1951, see Foreign Relations, 1951, vol. iii, Part 1, pp. 1163 ff.
5. For the text of this Tripartite Declaration, May 27, 1952, see vol. v, Part 1, p. 686, or Department of State Bulletin, June 9, 1952, p. 897.
6. For a record of Monnet’s meeting with Acheson on the following day, see the memorandum of conversation by Kitchen, Dec. 15, infra.